Raining on your Soul Only Raindrops
by Pumpkinee
Summary: Duo has been becoming more distant from his friends for awhile now. They've become worried, but Duo still refuses to be near. What kind of secrets is he hiding? One-shot!


MegaS-chan: Here's what goes—a one shot fic! *^_^* Fanfics and Sarah McLaughlin can do funny things to the brain. More than enough to push you over the edge for a good old fluffy fic.

Peach: Yes, here we go. One too many Gundam Wing fics that make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside like swallowing a manly pink puffball. Oh, the good times.

MegaS-chan: I love you, Unofficial Schwarz, and your insane conversations. Check out their profile, stories, and sites under their fanfiction.net account Unofficial Schwarz, especially if you like Fushigi Yugi or Weiss Kreuz fanfics.

Peach: Enjoi the story!

Raining on your Soul--Only Raindrops

By Megatokyo Seraphim

Notes: Okay, please, if you've bothered to get this far into my fic, read the whole thing. There's more sun than the curtain lets in.

"Duo…." Heero called to the boy reading on the couch. The tips of his eyes became visible from the top of his book, but quickly averted back.

"Listen, Heero, I know wh—"

"No, Duo. No, you don't. You've been avoiding me for awhile now. Ever since I said I wanted to talk to you, you've fallen apart from me, and I don't know why. I just wanted you to listen to what I have to say to you." Heero insisted as he took a chair across from Duo.

"No, no, I don't want you to say anything. I don't want to hear what's on your mind right now. I know what it is. Please, just…just leave me. Leave me alone."

Heero sat silently as the words sunk in, but continued on determinedly. "No! You don't know what I'm going to say. You don't! Duo…Duo! Look at me when I'm speaking to you!" He snatched at the novel, but Duo was too quick. He closed the book with his finger marking a page and repositioned himself on the couch, drawing away from Heero into the furthest ends of the couch.

"Duo…for a long time I've noticed that…that you are different from the rest." Heero fidgeted with his hands, watching them. "I…I think that I like you…As more than a friend." He looked up, his inexperience showing in his eyes. "I'm not real good at saying things like this, but I still really think that you could be…the one for me."

Duo closed his eyes, sighing deeply. "Heero…" He said, opening them again. They seemed leadened with sorrow. "I've realized for a long time that you've felt something for me. I could tell by the way you acted around me, becoming shy and awkward, dropping plates and food and blushing at any word I said to you. But…and this is very hard to say…Heero, I'm not. I'm not the one for you."

Heero began to stutter. "Shh, listen to me." Duo shifted on the couch again, eyes soft and filled with pain. "You want things from me that I can't give. I can't give you the closeness you desire between us. I can't give that to anyone." His gaze shifted to the floor. "I don't love you, Heero. Not as a lover, not as a boyfriend. I will never love you."

Duo glanced back at the other, and found him breathing deeply, staring at his shoes. He wiped at his nose and nodded. "I'm really sorry…"

"No, no, it's okay. You can't help it, right?" He gave a fleeting smile as he stood up abruptly and exited the room.

"Heero… Heero, I'm sorry…" Duo sighed heavily, and curled into a ball on the tough sofa. "I'm really sorry."

***

"Maybe he just needs time." Quatre told his companion. "Just give him his space for awhile, and I'm sure he'll come around."

Heero continued to look at the floor. Quatre felt the small nod Heero gave in his heart, and pushed the boy towards his bedroom. "Lay down for awhile, and you'll feel better."

"I seriously doubt that…" Heero mumbled as he headed off.

Quatre sighed and entered the kitchen, where he found the braided boy reading his book and sipping a drink.

"Hi." Quatre said as he entered, and Duo looked up.

Duo raised his eyebrow. "Hi." He returned to his book.

"Duo…" Searching for words, the blonde boy looked around. "How are you today? Are you okay?"

Duo looked up once more. Seeing the expression on Quatre's face, he shut his book and placed both hands on the table, sighing and smiling all at once. "Would you care to share what's on your mind?"

Quatre looked at him, wondering how their patient-doctor roles just switched. Deciding to get to the point, he spoke up. "Yes. I was talking to Heero today…"

"Yes, I'm sure you know all that's happened between us. Quatre—"

"Wait wait wait wait wait. Just let me make my point first, then you can reply."

Duo gave an offhanded shrug, and let the other continue his story. "He brought up a point to me that I've taken into a lot of thought. He's mentioned how you never really get close to anyone. You seem distant to us, even as friends. Now, _my_ line is, 'Would you care to share what's on _your_ mind?'"

Duo sighed calmly. "Look, it's just…I'm not a really close kind of person. I don't want, no, can't have someone as a boyfriend, girlfriend, lover, anything. It's just…not me." Quatre continued to watch intently to the boy. "Or should I say it _is_ me, and that's why I can't. As for you guys…It's normal to keep your best friends at a certain distance. I'm just one of those people, and it's okay. Trust me, tons of people do that. It's regular."

"No, it's not okay, and it's not normal." Trowa said, and emerged from behind the kitchen doorway frame, where he had been eavesdropping on their conversation. "It's not regular, and tons of people don't do it." Quatre's mouth closed as he came over the surprise of Trowa's sudden appearance.

Duo laced his fingers together, composed as ever. "Come on out, you two." He called out coolly. Heero and Wufei appeared from behind the kitchen walls as well.

"We're worried for you, Maxwell. We really are."

Heero nodded fervently. "If you need help, we can get you some. You don't come near us, and you avoid us even if we're brushing by. You don't talk, you don't joke, you don't laugh, or smile, or sing. You're acting so isolated."

"Is this because of the war?" Quatre questioned.

"Did something happen between you and someone else here?" Trowa added. "Something that makes you feel uncomfortable now?"

Duo chuckled lightly, shaking his head at the table. "You don't get it, do you?" He asked them all. "You just don't get it. Look," He looked each of his companions in the eye determinedly. "I'm not insane. I'm not sick. Nothing happened between any of you and me that makes me do strange things."

Breathing in deeply, Duo stood up and motioned to the big window. Sweeping his arm across the humid air, he waved to the outside. The others watched intently, wonderingly.

"Look. What do you see? Birds and grass and flowers. There are millions upon millions of things to see out there. Each and everyone of us is like something out there."

Duo gestured to the fiery warm sun. "Quatre," he said, "See the sun up there, so high in the sky? It watches over everything, helps everything. It gets up every morning for the people at the expense of itself. This is you up there. You watch after all of us, you care for us."

Duo motioned toward the sky. "You are the sky, Trowa. You contain the knowledge of the gods. You guide lost travelers, you bring hope in the stars you create for sick children and helpless adults to wish on. You are always there, blanketing the people in the night, and inviting them to play in the day."

"Heero," Duo continued, staring the boy in the eye. "You are the mountains. You create a windy path difficult for others to pass, but only in order to train them for the rough times they will experience on the other side. You stand firm and tall, no matter what howls at your crevices and cracks from the rocks. You stay determined through anything."

Duo turned to the last pilot. "And you, Wufei, are the great mother Earth. You are strong underneath the pressures given to you. You calm the people by your fresh scent. You make it possible for plants to have the strength to grow. You are strong throughout anything that is released upon you, and you never crumble away to your fears."

Duo let his arm fall to his side as he looked from pilot to pilot, eyes pooling with his passionate words. "And you all are the people. You are the people who inhabit the earth, who climb the mountains, who play games in the sky, who absorb the sun. You are the people who make all of these things have a purpose. You are emotional, you are passionate, you are unpredictable. You are all different types that form one thing—the human race.

"And what about me, you wonder? I am the rain. I am the rain that runs from the sky and the sun. When I hit the earth, or when I hit the mountains, or the people, I shatter. I am fragile, I am alone. I fall only by myself. When the sun brings me up high, I hide. When the clouds in the sky give me shelter, I run. When the earth absorbs me, I disappear. When the mountain makes me whole again in a river, I leave.

"Unlike you, I am not one of the people of the earth. I used to be, but all my running has given me misplacement. My only home is the path I am running to get away from you. You ask me why, I can hear it in the heartbeats of your soul. You question why I am not one of you anymore. Why? Because I am Death, and Death cannot be the things it takes. The closer I get to you, the less time you have to be of the people.

"Death has taken my own life by my sacrifice, and by such, I became its successor, to lead on what has been occurring for millions upon millions of years. I must take the lives of others so more can be born to become the people of the new age. New ones must be birthed so revolutions can occur, new discoveries can be made, and technology can thrive on to another level."

Duo paused and looked about to the others. The stood wordless, their mouths speaking silently to their minds. Comprehension formed a link to all events, and they stood still, asking questions madly without using any speech.

Duo breathed in calmly. "I hear you, as the rain, I pound in all of your hearts, creating a sad atmosphere, gloomy and depressing. I can hear your thoughts echo in my own heart as though they were my own." He looked to the floor, closing his eyes. "My sacrifice was my own. I chose to become the god of Death. The prices we pay for peace are ironic, and as a massacre occurred to my only family, I decided to lessen any more blows that were blindly dealt to the people of my own by taking matters into my own hands. But never again could I be considered one of you, one of the people of this precious world.

"I will always be apart from you. I cannot fall in love, as the person who could died in so many ways a long time ago in a demolished church ruin. You cannot change my mind, you cannot become close to me. You cannot keep me in your thoughts forever and be happy once again. I take no captives, I spare no lives, I contain no mercy in my actions. I am the only fear that the sun, the sky, the mountain, the earth, the people all share—death."

Duo glanced up, catching the weak eyes of his companions. He could feel their pounding hearts, their emotions flooding from fears and love. They lived inside of him, filling up the empty space inside him, creating the only environment he could keep going in.

He closed his eyes once more, standing up straight and slipping into the silence of the rest of the house, leaving behind the bewildered souls in the kitchen.

__

They may try to comfort me, but if I run, I can keep them safe. He grabbed his favorite novel and set it in a bag, picking some food up and setting it inside, as well. Sneaking through the front door so not to alert the stunned others, Duo began to evaporate from the life he once knew.

__

I can be the only one for me.

MegaS-chan: Ummm….Cute? Fluffy? Like Sunday pancakes and melted chocolate? Where are the jellybeans!? Where are the glompings, and pairings, and the feelings you get from snuggling a bunny!?!? WHERE!?!?!?

Peach: Wow, fluff just got a whole new definition.

MegaS-chan: ~nodnod~ I agree. I didn't think it'd be this sad after reading a cute 2x4 so-much-fluff-it's-like-hurling-on-Halloween fic! But it does bring a sad realization point to the story of Gundam Wing, doesn't it...

Peach: Serious, you'd never know this girl wrote these things if you knew her in real life. She's insanely happy, glomps EVERYONE, and squeals when the bishies just brush each other, nonetheless anything more. I think she's just skitzo, if you know what I mean.

MegaS-chan: Think what you like. I do hope you people liked it. Thanks for reading it! Please review, and check out my other works!

Thanks! ~Megatokyo Seraphim


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